Bill Daley slams Johnson's claim of 'decades of disinvestment' by past mayors

Mayor Brandon Johnson has blamed “decades of disinvestment and deliberate neglect” for the violence plaguing Chicago. He has accused his predecessors of "tolerating Black death" and "running this city into the ground” financially and ignoring the long-festering pension crisis.

The blame game doesn’t sit well with Bill Daley, brother of Richard M. Daley, Chicago’s longest-serving mayor and son of the city’s second-longest-serving mayor, Richard J. Daley.

That’s because the “decades of disinvestment” Johnson refers to includes both Daleys, who between them held office for 43 years.

“Any politician can say anything they want and not based upon any facts. When you look at the investments over 22 years that Rich made throughout this city and then you look at how he did in his election results across the city — getting 2% in his first election in the Black community and, the last time he ran, probably getting 70 or 80% in the Black community — that was a statement about the fairness,” Bill Daley said.

"Rich understood more than anybody when he became mayor that he had to address what was called Beirut-on-the-Lake at the time because of the racial divide. And he did everything in his words and his actions to address that. Not with great hyperbole. Not with accusations. Not with statements that are meaningless except for the words expressed through the air that comes out of the politician’s mouth.”

After winning the 1989 special election for the right to serve out the remainder of Harold Washington’s term, Richard M. Daley “didn’t spend time blaming Harold Washington or Eugene Sawyer for the problems he inherited. He rolled up his sleeves and got to work to solve those problems," Bill Daley said.

“Rich kept the rhetoric fairly low, understanding the sensitivity in the city at the time. That the words get you nowhere. It’s the actions that you do and the progress you make…That’s all the voters care about. They don’t care about the air that comes out of politicians’ mouths,” Bill Daley said.

Johnson likes to say that he expects to be mayor long enough to become Chicago’s longest-serving mayor.

Bill Daley essentially said, “We’ll see.”

“If Mayor Johnson is there for 22 years, then people will make a judgment as to whether or not he was fair to every community in this city and whether or not he understood that the city is not just one section of the city or one race or demographic of the city, but is a myriad of communities and people trying to live together and move forward. And that’s a big challenge for any mayor,” he said.

In April 2018, long-simmering tensions between then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Richard M. Daley boiled over when Bill Daley rose to the defense of his older brother.

The final straw was Emanuel’s decision to blame his predecessor and political mentor for the avalanche of tax increases needed to solve Chicago’s pension crisis.

“It’s unseemly to keep blaming the previous administration, which has been gone seven years,” Bill Daley, who followed Emanuel as White House chief of staff under former President Barack Obama, told the Chicago Sun-Times on that day. “ Come on. Put the big-boy pants on, and move on. It’s kind of sad.”

Compared to that emotional outburst, Bill Daley’s response to Johnson’s more pointed criticism of the Daley era was more dispassionate.

That was particularly true when he was asked to respond to Johnson’s June 20 claim: “When a 7-year-old is stepping outside their home and is gunned down, it’s an indication of the failures of previous administrations who have been intentional about leaving our communities behind.”

Johnson continued: “These are the same communities whose schools have been closed, public housing has been shuttered. These are the same communities in which gross disinvestment has been the prevailing form of politics in this city for decades. … This crisis did not show up with simply a bullet. This crisis showed up when previous administrations decided to give up on these communities,” Johnson said.

Daley fired back.

“How 'bout responsibility for the people who are committing the crimes? ... How about people being held responsible for their actions — whether it’s a 15-year-old child or whether it’s the parents of that 15-year-old child,” Bill Daley said.

After a four-day Fourth of July weekend during which more than 100 people were shot, 21 of them fatally, Johnson finally shifted, declaring Chicagoans have “had enough of it and vowed that “there will be consequences” for those responsible for “wreaking havoc on my streets.”

Daley essentially said it’s about time.

“Many politicians — they like to look backwards and talk about what wasn’t done. Yes, the pension situation wasn’t solved by Richard J. Daley or Jane Byrne or Mike Bilandic or Harold Washington or Gene Sawyer or Rich Daley or Rahm Emanuel or Lori Lightfoot or Brandon Johnson, yet. That’s true. And it’s still not solved,” he said.

“You can go back and blame all of those people. But, what are you doing today? What is happening today that’s gonna change that?”